[Aquitard]

To answer your question probably not unless I knew the person. I could argue the case that I would have outsourced the android UI scope if I was motivated enough to develop it and kept the backend to myself. I could then tinker with the front end and build upon it. However I wouldn't outsource now if I knew the person would just use LLM anyway. I'm the type that would rather build something myself than purchase off the shelf that does a similar job. It provides a huge learning opportunity that I don't want to miss.

I understand what you're saying. My opinion is I see agentic workflow similar to the star trek universe where they ask the computer questions and get a response while they continue with their work. But that doesn't mean not learning how to do things from first principles. This is what I tell juniors in my field when I pass jobs to them. They can use LLM but to ensure they know and understand what's going on and most do from their university degree. I think this is where we need to pivot towards when discussing LLM.

[scorpioxy]

Thank you for answering. I agree with you that, if used well, LLMs can be useful tools and increase efficiency. Unfortunately, what I am increasingly seeing is an increase in confidence but no increase in knowledge or understanding. I hope this is just a side-effect of the hype and corresponding bubble and not the future trajectory of knowledge work.

[theshrike79]

But it does increase knowledge and understanding.

Not in a deep deep level like "this is the optimal way to manage low level memory access in an Android application" but on a higher level of "It's possible to do a custom Android app in a week that's of decent quality for a small userbase".

Every piece of software doesn't need to be targeted for billion user hockey stick growth and an IPO as a target. It's perfectly fine to build something that's just right for 10 or 20 people. Or just for your immediate family.

For example I have a quiz tool I built with LLM assistance for Christmas that mine and my siblings kids use every December, they get clues appropriate for their level and rewards when they solve the daily task.

It's fine, has custom handling for every user etc. But also something I'd never bothered to build by hand from scratch nor something I'd pay someone to build for me. It was a fun "hmm, I wonder if..." project I started a few years ago on a late evening in November.

[washadjeffmad]

Foundational knowledge can be pretty far upstream of functional knowledge.

Whether you can't describe the analog circuits that correspond to the opcodes of the major mobile architectures running the platform of the app you're designing a UI for, or you couldn't have built any of the services you're hosting on from scratch, no one is going to be disappointed.

There are more people making more money off whatever we're currently calling making computers do things than ever before in history. The rest is largely business as usual.